To better understand oneself, it is important to know where one comes from. Exploring one’s genealogy is an interesting endeavor.

Here are some online tools that can help in the quest of exploring one’s genealogy.

1. Ancestry.com

Lindsey Danis from mashable, considers this as the most popular and accessible tool to trace genealogy. It’s app can be downloaded to any smartphone or iPhone device or just go directly to its official website. However, the functionality of the app is limited compared to the website especially in relation to filtering. One needs to flip back and forth between screens in order to make the connections.

Ancestry.com provides flexibility in its approach with regards to data collection and privacy. Users can opt to make the family tree public or to keep their information private.

Records were well optimized for mobile viewing. The availability of the text transcription, however, is unpredictable. It is important to note that the entry should be accurate otherwise one will get an inaccurate result as well. Erroneous results can be attributed to either the wrong entry or the service is rather inaccurate.

For fun experience, Ancestry.com has made the genealogy process to be enjoyable like playing games. The genetic clues it generates can be an easy starting point particularly to those who are new to this. Along the process users will be kept engaged just like social media experience where one thing leads to another discovery.

The company gives a 14-day free trial to use, subscription fee is US$39.99 per month or US$99.99 for 6 months membership.

2. MyHeritage

MyHeritage claims to be the most affordable DNA test available in the market. Its subscription fee roughly costs half of the Ancestry’s charge making it ideal for budget conscious. Those who are particular to privacy may enjoy its data privacy policy. The company assures users that it never sells any data and promises to uphold that commitment.

Because of its budgetary consideration, MyHeritage needs more improvement particularly in syncing information along the process. For instance, if one wants to explore great-grandmother’s information after learning about one’s great-grandfather, directly clicking into the great-grandmother records is not available. To do so one has to do a separate search for the great-grandmother. Ancestry.com allows users to hop from one relative to another with just a single click.

3. Findmypast

Findmypast is a good platform for Americans with British and Irish lineage. This genealogy tool is based in the UK and has partnership with British Newspaper Archive and National Archives of Ireland. These are where it gets its primary sources of historical records.

However, because the platform does not support the middle name field, too much result will come in searching a name. Filtering search is needed to trim down results to more relevant information. Subscription fee is US$10.75 per month after using the 14-day trial version.

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